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The Jedi: Religion, Philosophy, or Something Else?

Jedi Master Yoda

The Star Wars sagas present the Jedi alternately as the defenders of the Republic, adherents to an ancient religion, and rationalists who've gained an understanding of the nature of the universe -- leaving open the question: What are the Jedi?

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Sci-Fi / Fantasy Spotlight10

This Week: TV (May 20-27)

Sunday May 19, 2013
David Giuntoli as Nick Burkhardt, Reggie Lee as Sgt. Wu in

David Giuntoli as Nick Burkhardt, Reggie Lee as Sgt. Wu in "Goodnight, Sweet Grimm," the season finale of Grimm.


© Scott Green/NBC

This Week's TV Listings

 Next New Episodes
 Listings By Date
 Listings by Show Name
 Movies on TV

TELEVISION—New episodes this week from:

 Defiance,
 Grimm (season finale),
 Merlin,
 Orphan Black,
 Revolution,
 True Blood (recap),
 Warehouse 13.

Guest stars this week include Polly Walker and Joel Grey on Warehouse 13; Malik Yoba on Revolution.

Synopses below the jump. For details see the listings (regular or alphabetical). For sci-fi/fantasy movies on TV this week go to movie listings.

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Series Orders – Broadcast Networks

Monday May 13, 2013
Josh Holloway will star in a new CBS sci-fi-tinged series.

Josh Holloway will star in a new CBS sci-fi-tinged series.


© Kevin Winter/Getty Images

As part of their upfronts, the four broadcast networks announced their decisions on a number of pending sci-fi properties--and it's pretty much all good news.

The CW--The big question mark at the CW was whether Beauty and the Beast would be renewed, mainly because it was conspicuously absent from the network's enthusiastic renewals of the other three fantasy series on its schedule. But beast fans can breathe a sigh of relief: the show has been renewed for a second season.

Meanwhile, surprising absolutely no one, the network is going ahead with The Originals, the much talked about spin-off of The Vampire Diaries. The show was introduced during a back-door pilot installment of The Vampire Diaries episode that aired with much ado and success on Thursday, April 25.

CBS--After the petering away of A Gifted Man and, further back, Ghost Whisperer, CBS has been sitting out the supernatural genre. Instead, on the heels of its upcoming run of the Stephen King adaptation Under the Dome, it's heading into straight sci-fi procedural: the pilot Intelligence, about an agent (Lost's Josh Holloway) who has a microchip implanted in his brain, has gotten a series order from CBS. Also in the cast: Meghan Ory, John Billingsley, and Marg Helgenberger.

ABC--ABC has renewed ten series, including Once Upon A Time, and officially ordered two shoo-ins that have been on deck: Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., with Ming-Na and Iain De Caestecker, and the spin-off Once Upon a Time in Wonderland.

Tags: Beauty and the Beast, The Originals, Intelligence, Once Upon a Time, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.
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Series Orders - Cable Networks

Monday May 13, 2013
Joseph Kosinski is developing a much-anticipated sci-fi series for AMC.

Joseph Kosinski is developing a much-anticipated sci-fi series for AMC.


© Gage Skidmore

As the spring season winds up, a number of cable networks have announced or confirmed orders for shows of interest to sci-fi and fantasy fans.

Syfy--Syfy has renewed Defiance, after four episodes of the massive publicized hyprid TV series/gaming franchise. The network has given a 13-episode second season order to the series, which will begin production in Toronto in August for a 2014 premiere.

BBC America--Another new series has also been renewed only a few episodes into its freshman run. BBC America has renewed its original series, the conspiracy clone thriller Orphan Black for a second season. The show, from Temple Street Productions, will return with 10 new episodes as part of Supernatural Saturday in 2014.

AMC--Even AMC is getting into the act, and with an aim to impress. Their upfront presentation included a futuristic drama called Ballistic City, which tells the story of a former cop thrust into the criminal underworld of a city housed in a generational space ship destined for a an unknown world. The series is generating some excitement because it's being directed and executive produced by Tron Legacy and Oblivion director Joseph Kosinski--and and written and executive produced by Pacific Rim writer Travis Beacham. With that logline and caliber of creators, hopes for another Battlestar Galactica are mounting, but we'll have to wait to hear more.

Lifetime--Lifetime has placed Witches of East End on its schedule for the fall. The new series, Lifetime's first essay into the paranormal, stars Julia Ormond, Jenna Dewan-Tatum, and Madchen Amick in a drama about a family of witches. The network ordered 10 episodes.
Tags: Defiance, Orphan Black, Ballistic City, Witches of East End, Joseph Kosinski
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Futurama Canceled (Again)

Monday May 13, 2013


© Comedy Central

Comedy Central has announced that Futurama, the hip animated series that was launched on Fox in 1999, ran for five seasons until its much-lamented cancellation in 2003, only to be relaunched with great fanfare in 2010, will end its second life this year after four summers of newly minted awesome.

The culprit seems to be tepid ratings. Futurama has always had a smaller but more fervent fanbase than its more mainstream cousins like The Simpsons, and the latest runs on Comedy Central haven't built the network any new audiences or, for that matter, served much as water-cooler fodder in real life or the twitterverse.

The axe certainly came as no surprise to the show's creators. "I felt like we were already in the bonus round on these last couple of seasons, so I can't say I was devastated by the news," series executive producer and co-developer David X. Cohen told Entertainment Weekly. "It was what I had expected two years earlier. At this point, I keep a suitcase by my office door so I can be cancelled at a moment's notice."

Of course, jokes about the show's having survived death already littered the reaction, from Comedy Central honchos on down. "The upcoming season promises to be the best final season of Futurama yet," quipped network veep Dave Bernath. Hahaha, that's hilarious, Dave.

Creator Matt Groening likewise sounded almost as though Futurama can't really die, hedging his quote on the big final season. "I'm very proud of the upcoming season," he said. "If this is indeed the end of Futurama, it's a fantastic finish to a good, long run."

The show's final season debuts on Wednesday, June 19; its finale is slated for Wednesday, September 4. Guest stars for the final season include Larry Bird and Emilia Clarke alongside such obvious contenders as Dan Castellaneta, Sarah Silverman, George Takei, Adam West, and Burt Ward. Larry Bird? Shouldn't he be on The Neighbors?

The Comedy Central run, which officially counts as seasons 6 and 7 (both divided in half over two summers, which--why doesn't that count as four seasons, again?), amounts in total to 52 episodes, bringing the total number of eps for the franchise up to 140. (Just for comparison, Groening's other big claim to fame in TV land, The Simpsons, has racked up over 530 episodes. And yet there were only 14 Fireflys.)

Could Futurama ever rise again? It sounds as though both Groening and Cohen are wary of running Futurama into the ground, even were they given the chance. "We've been in this situation before," Groening said, "and it's tempting when you're doing episodes that are as good or better than anything you've ever done to continue doing it."
Tags: Futurama, Matt Groening, David X. Cohen
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